


It's Hard To Be Brave When You're Alone In The Dark

by whatsdunisdun



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: AU where Connor is okay because he has Evan, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Connor is not dead, Established Relationship, Implied/Referenced Suicide, In-depth description of suicide, M/M, Nightmares, Read the beginning author's note before reading!!, Suicide trigger warning, They're both okay I promise, Tree Bros, Vomit trigger warning, even though that's not really how mental illness works, i guess, low-key panic attack?, shhhhhh its like 3am I'm doing my best
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2019-02-23 13:55:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13191489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatsdunisdun/pseuds/whatsdunisdun
Summary: As he sat up, slowly, Evan’s brain came back online, and he was reminded that the dream wasn’t too far from reality.Not that - Connor would be fine. He is fine.But, Evan thought, Connor had tried before to -And no, Evan wasn’t going to go there. There was an easier thing to do.(Based off the prompt 'I had a nightmare about you and just want to make sure you're okay')





	It's Hard To Be Brave When You're Alone In The Dark

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: This fic focuses entirely around conversations regarding a suicide attempt. (Which is somewhat a standard, between what I tend to write about and what actually happens in Dear Evan Hansen. So.) I promise everyone is completely fine, but the description of the attempt is quite detailed, and might be really upsetting. Please be aware of this and of your own limits. I’ll put a brief (spoilery) content warning that goes a bit more in depth in the end-notes. 
> 
> Title is from Nightmares by All Time Low!
> 
> Hiya!! This is actually my first fic in this fandom, but this show is such a massive part of my life and the fan base even moreso, so it's amazing to finally have some work for it out there. I hope you enjoy this tiny little one shot I threw togther quickly!

Evan jolted awake.  

_‘Connor! Connor, no!’_  

The room was pitch black. The vague light of his alarm clock read 3:27 am. 

_Evan screamed. His hands scrambled for purchase, but the rusty bridge was slippery, and he crawled back from the edge to avoid falling._  

He tried, with every part of his mind and body, to push the panic back down, far away enough that he could breathe. 

_He watched, detached, as Connor’s body fell, down, down, down. His hands hung helplessly in the air, pointing, pleading, at the spot where Connor had been only moments before._  

Evan threw up into the trash can beside his bed, gulped water down from a glass lying around, and tried to slow his breathing. 

_Connor was still falling. He fell endlessly. Screams ripped out of Evan’s throat, but he didn’t hear them. He was listening for the sound of a splash as Connor fell into the cold, dark water, hundreds of feet below where Evan sat…_

The panic slowly receded from his brain, and as his breathing evened out, he took in his surroundings, cataloguing the world he was in. 

_It was just a dream. It’s okay. I’m fine. Connor’s fine._

As he sat up, slowly, Evan’s brain came back online, and he was reminded that the dream wasn’t too far from reality. Not that - Connor would be fine. He _is_ fine _._ _But_ , Evan thought, _Connor had tried before to -_

And no, Evan wasn’t going to go there. There was an easier thing to do. 

He should have been doing it to _remind_ himself that Connor was okay, just to hear his voice, to fully bring himself back to reality where Connor was _fine_ and not in any danger and he was doing _better, Evan, I’m getting there._ However, though he didn’t want to admit it, a part of him felt the need to know for sure - because he could be anywhere, for all Evan knew, he could be dead, he could’ve been dead for _hours -_

He reached out for his phone on his bedside table, slowly, carefully, not wanting to knock anything and wake his mother ( _or scare himself_ , he thought, pathetically). He turned his phone screen on, the brightness blinding him briefly, and found a text from Connor - the time stamp read 11:43 pm. 

**Hey, u awake?**  

Before he could blink, the panic rushed back in, and his head spun, as he fought to avoid throwing up into the trash can again. 

Fingers fumbling, he tried once, twice, three times before he managed to type in his passcode and unlock the phone. Without hesitation, he clicked on Connor’s name in his contacts, and called him, the ringtone resounding loudly through the dark room as he reached across the town to where Connor (hopefully) lay in his bed. 

Ring… 

_(please be awake)_

Ring… 

_(please be_ _alive_ _)_

Ring… 

Still panicking, Evan saw the dream enter his head again, remembering the way Connor went limp as soon as his body left the ground, the way Evan had pleaded with him to _Please, Connor, please just take a step back, please, pleasepleaseplease, don’t do this, it’s not worth it, I don’t know how I would cope without you, I can’t go on alone, please don’t leave me now, not after everything, you said you were doing_ better, _you’ve never been a liar, just PLEASE -_  

“Connor Murphy, the fuck is calling me at-” Connor’s voice trickled out of the speakers on Evan’s phone, “3 am?”

Evan felt all of his breath leave his body in one shaky exhale, and the panic disappeared again, but this time he felt it linger at the edges of his brain, as if waiting for another cue. 

“S-sorry. Did -” Evan didn’t know where to start. The only thought in his brain was _he’s okay he’s okay he’s okay he’s okay._ “Did I wake you up? Are you okay?” 

“Ev?” Connor sounded confused. There was a pause. Evan imaged Connor frowning in confusion. “Why are you even awake?”

“I - I had a nightmare about you and I just - I just wanted to make sure you were okay.” The truth tumbled out of Evan’s mouth before he could stop it, so he just went with it, adding on quickly, “Also you texted, asking for me, but I was asleep. I’m sorry if you needed me for something and I wasn't there I really didn’t mean for you to-”

“Evan. Breathe. I’m fine. I just wanted to ask you about the - the -  it doesn’t even matter. Just - what happened? What did you dream about? Are _you_ okay?”

“I - no, you don’t want to hear about that. I just - you - you promised me you were doing better, Connor. And I believed you. I _do_ believe you. I want it to be true so badly but - _are_ you doing better? I just need to know that you’re okay.” 

There was a pause. The only thing reassuring Evan was the continued sound of Connor breathing - in, out, in, out, in, out. Sudenly, Connor exhaled roughly, and words started spilling from Evan’s phone in a manner that suggested Connor had no idea what to say. 

“I - _Jesus,_ Evan, what happened in your dream? I would never lie to you about this, and you know it! It’s been so long since - since I felt like - like that. Since I’ve lied about the pain. You - you know as well as I do that not every day is perfect - that most days don’t even come close, but they’ve still been _better_. Better than they were before - before you.”

He sighed loudly. “Talk to me, Ev. What happened? You sound - you sound afraid. Tell me about your dream.” 

“I don’t think you should hear about this. It can’t - it won’t - it might hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Ev, please. I think this is hurting you more than it could ever hurt me. I know it’s scary - it sounds it. Just. Talk to me, please. You know you won’t be able to trust sleep again until you’ve talked all of this through.”

“I -” Evan paused, and inhaled deeply, then all of a sudden the words came tumbling out, too fast for Evan to filter them, “you know that bridge? The one that’s really high above the river, just near that picnic spot we went to a while ago? The one I hate driving over, because it scares me?” 

“Yeah?” Connor sounded cautious. Whatever had happened in Evan’s dream, Connor now knew it wasn’t good. At all. 

“We - we were there, and it was dark, but there was no stars, just the moon, and I could just see you. I - I was standing on the road, a little way away from you. You were standing on - on the very edge of the bridge. You - you were about to start climbing the railing. I was - _Jesus, Connor,_ I was so fucking scared. And you - you just kept moving - you wouldn’t _listen_ to me, it was like you didn’t even register that I was there! And I felt so _helpless_ , I could barely move, and I was yelling the same things over, and over, and over, and it did _nothing_ and I’d finally started to feel like I was helping you and then -” Evan’s voice broke off into sobs, and as he let out one shaky breath after the other and felt a stream of tears fall down his cheeks, Connor quietly comforted him. 

“Shhhhhh, Ev, it’s okay, I’m right here, you’re okay, everything’s going to be okay, it was just a dream.” 

When Evan eventually caught his breath, he kept going. He could maybe pretend that the dream had ended there, but Connor knew him too well, and he’d absolutely call him out on lying. A smaller, less significant part of Evan’s brain pointed out that Evan kind of desperately needed to talk about the whole thing to get it out, just as Connor had said.

“You - you were standing on top of the railing and I finally made my body move so I started walking towards you, but slowly, because I didn’t want to scare you, and I was just calling out gently, not sure what else to do and you just - you turned around to look at me, and I thought ‘Finally!’ because before that I wasn’t even sure you knew I was there! And then, then, you looked me in the eye and just - you gave me that tiny little sad smile, like you’d already made up your mind, like you were resigned to your fate or what the fuck ever, like you were _sorry,_ but it wasn’t _enough_ because you _promised me_ that you were doing better and that this kind of thing would never happen and that you would talk to me first and that you would _listen to me!_ And then you just - looked back, facing forward, not even looking down at the water down below you and you - you just - let go. And - and - and your body started to fall, and I think I was screaming, and yelling your name but nothing made sense and I couldn’t understand anything but I ran to the edge and it was slippery and I didn’t want to fall so I crawled back a bit but I looked down and you were just. you were just falling down, your body was completely limp, and that was _it_ , Connor, you were gone. And - now I can’t stop seeing your body as it fell. And - I know now that it was just a dream but it felt like I was stuck there for _forever_ , and, and, and I don’t want to think about the fact that that _could_ have been _real,_ so please Connor just promise me again that you’ll always talk to me if you - if you feel like _that,_ because - _fuck!_ \- I don’t know what I’d do without you!”

Evan breathed deeply again, willing himself not to break into sobs again, but there were still tears rolling down his cheeks. 

 “It’s okay Evan, I’m not going anywhere. I promise you. I have you now, nothing like that will happen. I promise. I swear it on everything I own. I’m okay. We both are.”

Evan believed him. He always had. 

“Okay. Okay, Connor. I’m sorry.” 

“It’s ok Ev, don’t be sorry. I’m right here, everything’s okay now.”

Evan thought maybe everything that needed to be said had been. This dialogue would never be over for as long as the two of them were in each other’s lives, but sometimes there was nothing else to be said - they just both needed to know the other was there. They listened to each other breathing, and slowly, everything became okay again. 

Both boys’ breaths slowly started evening out, and right as they were both on the edge of consciousness, Connor’s voice filled the darkness of both bedrooms. 

“Hey, Evan?”  
  
“Yeah?” 

“I love you. You know that, right?” 

“I - yeah. I know. I love you too.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Content warning: Evan has a dream about Connor committing suicide by jumping off a bridge, which is both reflected on and spoken about between the two boys. Evan describes, in depth, what he saw.
> 
> (By the way, if you’re wondering why Connor texted Evan at 11:43pm to see if he was awake, I imagine it was something completely inconsequential and ridiculous. Like, he was seeing if Evan was awake so he could ask him wether or not he knew that there were 1.5 billion cows on the earth (1.5 billion, Evan, holy shit, that’s so many fucking cows) because a Tired Connor Murphy is a Vaguely Insane Connor Murphy (same) and he only wanted Tired Evan to have to judge him on that, not Perfectly Awake And Sane Evan, hence not just texting Sleeping Evan about the fucking cows at 11:43pm.)
> 
> (ABOUT THOSE COWS - THAT’S ONE OF THE MANY FUN FACTS I LEARNT FROM THE AUTHORS NOTES IN MY FAVOURITEST DEH FIC, BLACK HOLE BY @aliensinflowercrowns, SO PLEASE PLEASE CHECK THAT OUT ALSO!!! YOU WILL ABSOLUTELY NOT REGRET IT)
> 
> Thank you for reading!!!!! Lemme know thoughts in the comments, I'm ALWAYS open for prompts or requests, and be sure to come scream with/at me (or just watch me scream) on my tumblr, @anybodyhavealaurens !!


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